In the Grand Tradition of Pin-up Art

Here are a couple of recent efforts in a genre that's over a century old:

   

According to Wikipedia, the term "pin-up" was coined in the 1940s, but the genre itself can be traced back to the 1890s.

Here's a cool vintage pin-up blog by a woman who collects old pin-up art. IllustrationArt also had a great post on the genre that lacks (maybe deservedly so) serious respect in the art world.

Focusing on Figures

I've mostly been on a life drawing kick lately. My archive of life drawings has grown to an unwieldy size and the few that I think stand out from the pack are getting lost in the noise. So, I've added a new Figures section to my main gallery page, which features just a few of my favourites.

On a related note, processjunkie (AKA a blog run by Alberto Ruiz) posted an article featuring his favourite classic figure drawing books with handy links to download them in electronic formats.

More from life

Most recent pieces from life drawing sessions:

Keeping it real

Whatever other drawing practice one does, there just isn't a good substitute for drawing from life. These are a couple from my last life drawing session at TSA:

Another Vintage

Might as well post another vintage figure while I'm at it. I was actually kinda pleased with the torso of this one, but I'm still not getting great results with my fabric and folds.

Swinger, Slave

This DeviantArt member posts a lot of really useful public-domain vintage photos which are ideal to use as drawing reference.



I find these photos are great for lighting, poses as well as hand and feet, which the photographers of the time seemed to pay a lot of attention to.

4 Stock Sketches

Just a few quick ink figures to keep the blog alive.



This DeviantArt photographer has great reference material for figure sketching practice.

Ink Figures

Lately, I've been enjoying using the combo of fountain pen and brush pen when I go to life drawing sessions.

    

And I was just thinking

about how I needed to learn more about human anatomy, and how to apply it to figure drawing.

This drawing gave me all sorts of trouble, trying to figure out how the obscured hips and right leg would look, and how the legs would attach.



Lucky for me then that I should stumble upon Riven Phoenix's The Structure of Man - 170 sequential videos freely viewable on YouTube, teaching you classical techniques on how to draw the figure from your mind. A fantastic project! I have a feeling this will become a staple of modern, internet-enabled art instruction. Thank you Riven Phoenix for creating such a valuable resource.

More Poses

    

Tricky exercises in extreme perspective/foreshortening and motion. Reference courtesy of DeviantArt stock artists.